Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to a system and method for providing lateral control for lane centering, lane keeping and/or lane changing purposes in an autonomously driven or semi-autonomously driven vehicle that is towing a trailer and, more particularly, to a system and method for providing lateral control for lane centering, lane keeping and/or lane changing purposes in an autonomously driven or semi-autonomously driven vehicle that is towing a trailer, where the system provides a corrected vehicle steering path if the trailer will cross out of the vehicle lane when traveling through a curve if the vehicle follows a current path.
Discussion of the Related Art
The operation of modern vehicles is becoming more autonomous, i.e., vehicles are able to provide driving control with less driver intervention. Cruise control systems have been on vehicles for a number of years where the vehicle operator can set a particular speed of the vehicle, and the vehicle will maintain that speed without the driver operating the throttle. Adaptive cruise control systems have been recently developed in the art where not only does the system maintain the set speed, but also will automatically slow the vehicle down in the event that a slower moving preceding vehicle is detected using various sensors, such as radar and cameras. Certain modern vehicles also provide autonomous parking where the vehicle will automatically provide the steering control for parking the vehicle. Some vehicle systems provide automatic braking to prevent rear-end collisions. As vehicle systems improve, they will become more autonomous with the goal being a completely autonomously driven vehicle, where future vehicles may employ autonomous systems for lane changing, passing, turns away from traffic, turns into traffic, etc.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,170,739 issued May 1, 2012 to Lee, titled, Path Generation Algorithm for Automated Lane Centering and Lane Changing Control System, assigned to the Assignee of this application and herein incorporated by reference, discloses a system for providing vehicle path generation for automated lane centering and/or lane keeping purposes. The system detects lane markings on the roadway, generates a desired vehicle path in the travel lane, and provides automatic steering that maintains the vehicle in the lane.
Although the system and method for providing path generation for automated lane centering and lane keeping purposes disclosed in the '739 patent is effective for steering the vehicle to stay in the travel lane, the system and method is not applicable for maintaining a towed vehicle in the lane even though the towing vehicle stays in the lane when the vehicle travels around a curve.